Try 1: 31:06
Try1-0 lead-up: 29:31 McIlwrick gets called for a knock on after having to jump over Wallace in the ruck. Just for mine, not only was the ball knocked back, doesn’t matter how badly McIlwrick milks the ruck, Wallace is not allowed to get up in the back of the ruck. The rules clearly state he has to roll away before retreating, he was doing this repeatedly and Moses got him with a pass at one stage, but he cannot be getting up where the DH is trying to pick up the ball, I don’t care how much the DH milks it. Poor refereeing.

Try 1-1 Tackle 3, Lawrence (1) is a little slow after the last tackle to come forward, Brooks is currently on his man Martin. But the gap between (1) and (2) is too big, Lawrence is inside Moylan already and Brooks is about to come in.

Try 1-2 reverse angle, Lawrence and Brooks are already being beaten on the outside (parallel lines). I know Andrew Johns points out MCK on the Ch9 coverage as being “beaten by the pass”, but it is my opinion here that he is drawn inwards because he can see the Panthers attack already beating his inner players. Brooks might have come forward a little too fast here and he has planted his feet, meaning Moylan is going to run right to him even though Lawrence is coming across. I give 0.5 SUU to Lawrence here for being slow back into the line. Lawrence had come in to assist the previous tackle on Fisher-Harris but wasn’t actually required.

Try 1-3 this is Whare about the get the pass outside MCK (2). I don’t know what Brooks (1) is doing here honestly, he’s jammed the gap against Moylan but it must be 2 feet wide at this stage, he needs to be moving left BEFORE Moylan reaches him and passes. TMM is already on his outside by some way, it’s no wonder MCK has come in. Moylan is counting on Brooks getting interested, that’s the whole point of this play, running at Brooks to get his outside runners in wide holes. Look at the crazy space between 1-2-3. Suli (3) really should have come in here and tried to pressure Whare, it’s pretty evident that MCK is beaten. I give Suli 0.5 SUU for not moving in with his man, but Brooks gets 1.0 SUU for misreading the play.

Try 1-3 this is MCK totally beaten, Suli needs to have come in earlier as I said, but it’s MCK’s fault primarily from here on. MCK gets 1.0 SUU for being too far in.

But you see this continual pattern: yes it’s the centres who are exploited and you leave the game thinking about where the tries were scored, but see how Brooks committing himself to Moylan – not even his man – creates the holes out wide.

Try 2 36:59 (5:53 elapsed)
Try 2-0 lead up 1 – Moses puts in a crap kick from DH straight to Moylan, who runs across field and links up with Peachey. No idea where Nofo is, he doesn’t get involved until Peachey brings the ball all the way back.

Try 2-00 leadup 2 – this is the same set, Brooks has again been beaten (by Martin this time) and MCK has come in, giving Whare another wide channel; Suli holds his line. MCK manages to hit the ball but it’s an almost exact repeat of Try 1.

Try 2-000 leadup 3 – next set off the knock down, Moylan skips across and Suli comes in when MCK already has him covered, Brooks is on the wing from the previous play, but Whare again in miles of space but Brooks manages to bat it down. We are clearly on the ropes here.

Try 2-1 tackle 2, remember that Brooks has been beaten on the outside about 4 times in the previous few sets, I know he’s gunning for Moylan and Penrith’s shape looks like he’s going to receive, but that’s the whole point of these attacking plays, you change it up after when you think the defence is over-reading. Brooks is clearly about to charge into the hole and Kikau is about to be afforded an enormous gap.

Try 2-2, Brooks ends up, what, 7 metres behind the ball? Sure he’s all over Moylan but Moylan isn’t even his man here, #14 Fisher-Harris is, if Penrith had gone wide it still would likely have been 3-on-2. This is as bad a read as you can get, forces Kikau to run and Lawrence to make a 1-1 tackle with a much bigger man. Fair enough Lawrence needs to make these tackles, but if Brooks holds his line it reduces the Penrith options and Brooks ends up having no impact at all. Brooks gets 2.0 SUU here, Lawrence 1.0 SUU for the MT.

Try 2-3 just the reverse angle, Brooks totally out of the line. JT should ask Brooks this week if he knows what a salient is (in military terms) and why it’s such a bad thing.

Try 3 – 39:54 (2:55 elapsed)
This is the end of the game for me. Just conceded a try, the 2:55 is the post-try recap, conversion, kickoff and ensuing set. Kickoff at 39:06, we’ve been on the ropes for the last 7 or 8 minutes, we just need one good set and we regroup in the sheds down by 10. One try after HT and we are back in it. But no, try scored with 6 seconds remaining. Literally one more tackle would have done it.

Try 3-0 lead up – tackle 3, Yeo gets a quick PTB and Wallace pushes through Aloiai and ET. I draw your attention here to Aloiai’s weak ruck work (1), ET has made a legs tackle and is rushing to get back onside, but Aloiai is doing some shirt grabbing even though he was properly involved in the tackle. He needs to have been using his torso more to make it difficult for Yeo to get up.

Try 3-1 here is Wallace (1) away from the ruck and bringing the attack to the defence. But it’s still 3-3 out here, Moses on Cleary, both centres and wingers matched.

Try 3-2 this is bad decision making from Naiqama, Moses (1) has made a decent legs tackle on Cleary but Naiqama (2) has already come in and the pass is about to beat him badly on the outside. I realise that our halves make a lot of MTs but we just cannot afford to keep pushing in from the centres only, either the whole team does it as a strategy, or we hold our line and slide (my preference), but Naiqama does nothing here except get stuck and not trust his man – 1.0 SUUs.

Try 3-3 one of the best non-tackle collisions you will see. Nofo (1) absolutely collects Peachey who just shrugs him off and runs off down-field. Nofo does the right thing coming in when Naiqama (2) is so far in-field (seriously what is he doing there) but he doesn’t affect the tackle.

Try 3-4 in the cover Sue does quite well really and reels Peachey in, but Edwards smokes Naiqama who has not recovered and runs onto the pass. Query here on whether Tedesco needed to come across so hard on Peachey, he gets caught well short of the line and the inside pass hits Edwards on Tedesco’s far inside. All the same, it’s Naiqama’s mistake (1.0 SUU) and Nofo’s bad MT (1.0 SUU).

Real problem at this juncture is the RHS defence has actually not been that bad for the best part of 40 mins, despite the history of it being so. Penrith have mostly exploited our LHS to good effect. Disappointing that when Penrith shift the other way the RHS falls apart too.

Try 4-0 leadup – Tigers have done alright 9 minutes into the second half and not stretched too much. Unfortunately Tedesco doesn’t score the set earlier and Penrith go length-of-field on the following 7-tackle set. Here Tigers have snuffed out a half-chance and Moses has a nice slow tackle on Edwards. Martin is set deep for the kick, there isn’t really enough urgency on the kick pressure but I do realise they have nearly 20 metres to close.

Try 4-1 – despite the distance Sue (1) gets within a few m of Martin, he sort of ambles up then picks up speed as he sees TMM take his sweet time with the kick. The rest of the players are fairly low energy. Problem with letting TMM take his sweet time is it’s a very good kick and all the Penrith runners arrive as it lands. There were calls for offside here but I drew out the 20 and 30 m lines to the horizon (well off the screen), then drew a line from TMM’s feet to meet them, to give me a straight line on the field, and I’m happy enough that Lat’s back foot is behind that line.

Try 4-2 – easy review here, Suli moves to the ball well and watches it, but he has to learn to leap, he’s a big fellow but Latu jumps and gets the position. Suli 1.0 SUU here.

Last edited by jirskyr on Mon 13 Mar, 2017 1:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Try 5-0 leadup 1 – disappointing here, the previous try was just a bit of laziness and Penrith good kick, Tigers have been fighting though and the half is almost 25 minutes old when we concede the second try. But this is a trend for us, first half we stuck with them 30 mins, second half we stick with them 24 mins, but the last 10-15 of each half is a runaway. Previous set Tigers right on the attack but Idris puts down a Brooks pass on the 5th, team is clearly tired, Waqa Blake exploits a lack of cover (a tired ET and JLJ) and an ordinary missed tackle by Brooks.

Try 5-00 leadup 2 – Moylan gets tackled 36 out but Penrith go from defence to attack, they get an offside penalty in this set and then score.

Try 5-1 – tackle 1, that’s how out we are on our feet, tackle 1 post penalty and Penrith stretch the ball. But this is ok at the moment, it’s 3-3 and they are more or less in a straight line.

Try 5-2 – the above being said, reverse angle, I don’t really like how Tigers continually show their opposites the outside. They need to get themselves more in front because Penrith spent the entire afternoon getting on the outside of their man and running into gaps.

Try 5-3 – Brooks (1) murders this. I don’t know if Idris (2) is talking, they should be yelling here because there is very clearly a switch about to happen. This is what worries me most about Brooks, because it’s a 3-3 situation with a wide open space, and he gets beaten on a very simple attacking move. Seriously if you are a professional footballer man-on-man and they beat you with the switch or run-around, and I don’t mean beat as in break a tackle or out-run / out-power you, I mean beat you all ends up, then you have problems. If this was touch football Brooks still would have been beaten by the cut-back of Whare. Brooks gets 2.0 SUU here, all his fault.

Try 5-4 on replay here Sterlo says “lazy cover from Chee-Kam” but it’s not MCK’s (2) man, he’s tracked across-field after marking Moylan. Yes he maybe could have pushed a little harder but I think at this stage MCK has played a half at centre and most of a 2nd half at backrow, and he ends up in Brook’s position trying to affect a cover tackle. Brooks is standing on Idris’ toes, it’s just pathetic defence and shows how much he struggles to read what is being thrown at him.

Try 6-0 lead up – ordinary backfield bomb by Brooks, no planning and no chasers, Penrith get the ball about 20 out and work it downfield. They aren’t even making huge yardage, tackle 4 occurs on the Tigers’ 45.

Try 6-1 – however this is back, RHS holding a straight line but where are the numbers? Moses (1) is 3 in, he should be in front of Yeo, Naiqama (2) is 5 metres inside Peachey. It’s a great pass by Moylan, but all he has to do is run at the gap between Moses and Naiqama (same our LHS) and he gets TWO of his players outside the winger. Moses gets 0.5 here for miscounting.

Try 6-2 – Nofo (1) recovers but he arm-grabs Peachey and mostly misses. I’m also starting to worry about Naiqama’s (2) overall speed this year, the Penrith support runs straight past him a few times this game.

Try 6-3 – Nofo (1) ends up bringing Peachey down but the pass is away, Naiqama (2) does really poorly here, he is in the right spot for cover but Edwards beats him with a hit and spin. Nofo and Frozone both 1.0 SUU for miscounting and miss-tackling.

Try 6-4 – poor Ava, doesn’t have the speed to stay with Cleary. Ava is the only guy who is noticeably communicating here, pointing for the cover to focus on Edwards. Where is the talking and pointing in the lead up?

Very interesting summarize and comments. Totally agree on the first try with the so called infringement in the play the ball. He (Sutton )over officiates sometimes. He's so used to RF trying to milk penalty in years gone by maybe. Don't know what goes through his mind but Wallace should be making an attempt to clear the ruck at least.

Last edited by maxxy86 on Tue 14 Mar, 2017 3:06 am, edited 1 time in total.

Agree with both of you too. The refereeing for the first try, with a knock on call, made very little sense. Where exactly was the knock on?

MMc picks it up, turns backwards and trips over Wallace who pushes to his feet at the same. The ball pops out backwards to the Tigers and it ends up behind the play with Naiqama who gets tackled. So it's a knocked back, because it's not in the act of playing the ball, which is where refs often call knock-on for any drop in any direction.

I found the refs were a bit like this in our game, ruling any borderline fumbles as knock ons, and being quite ruthless on forward passes. Then you compare to the Cowboys game when James Roberts gets away with a quarterback-style forward pass for the Kahu try.

Interesting that the middle hasn't let any tries in yet. Poor edge defence, year after year. I wonder when someone will do something about it. Matchball is right, Brooks' defence has got better, but his reads are just absolutely terrible and making everyone else look bad.